Adventures in CRE (A.CRE)

If you're trying to learn financial modeling on your own, you probably know the problem. A YouTube video on debt sizing here. A blog post on waterfalls there. An Excel model someone sent you that you can use, but don't fully understand. Eventually you know a little about a lot, but still aren't sure you could build the thing yourself. That's why Michael and I built the A.CRE Accelerator. It's a comprehensive, case-based curriculum that teaches real estate financial modeling in the right order. You work through actual deals, modeling the cash flows yourself from a blank Excel worksheet. Learn the mechanics. Build the model. Underwrite the deal.

“Why is the gross levered IRR 18%?” It's one thing to know where IRR is in the model. It's another to understand what's actually driving it. Rent growth? Exit cap? Leverage? Lease-up? Hold period? Eventually, someone senior is going to ask and your answer, “that's what the model says”, just doesn’t cut it. That's why Michael and I built the A.CRE Accelerator. You take control of the methodology, and in the process, learn how each assumption flows through to returns. So when someone asks why, you know the answer.

The people at the firms you're trying to get into all learned to model somewhere. At some point, they had to move from using templates to building institutional-quality real estate financial models from a blank Excel workbook. It’s not something they were taught in school or picked up on the job. It required a specific approach to learning the skill. And for thousands of top CRE professionals, the A.CRE Accelerator is where they developed that skill. The Accelerator is a comprehensive, case-based curriculum that teaches you to model real estate cash flows from scratch. And when you're done, you'll have the skills (and the credential) to be the real estate financial modeling expert in the room.

Most CRE pros learn to use a template model before they learn to build one. They inherit a model built by someone who came before them, and when they get hired, are taught which assumptions to put into which cells. Then, one day, their MD asks, “Hey, could you add another tranche of debt?” to the model, and they have no idea where to start. They were never taught the mechanics behind the model, let alone how to rebuild the model from scratch. That's why Michael and I built the A.CRE Accelerator. The A.CRE Accelerator is a comprehensive, case-based real estate financial modeling curriculum that teaches you to build institutional-quality models starting with a blank Excel worksheet. And you'll get there in weeks, not years.

“Take a first pass at the underwriting.” Eventually, every young CRE professional hears some version of that. You're handed the OM, rent roll, T-12, maybe a few assumptions from your VP, and expected to come back with an opinion of the deal. But there's a big difference between knowing how to change the assumptions in someone else's model and knowing how to build the thing yourself. How do you parse the rent roll flow, model downtime and TI/LCs, or build out the sources and uses table? Those aren't Excel questions. They're real estate financial modeling questions. That's why Michael and I built the A.CRE Accelerator around actual real estate case studies. You start with a blank Excel worksheet and build the model yourself, learning the mechanics behind the underwriting as you go. So the next time someone hands you a deal and says, “Take a first pass,” you know where to start.

Want to see a construction draw schedule built from scratch, step by step? We’ve just updated our “Watch Me Build a Construction Draw Schedule” post, including a full-screen, recorded walkthrough, a merged blank + completed template, and a new Version tab so you can track changes over time. In the video, we break down: how LTC actually drives your debt sizing, why equity is drawn first, then debt, then interest reserve, and how to model a full draw schedule without circular references. If you’re underwriting development deals and still hacking together draw schedules, this is a great place to level up your modeling. Watch the walkthrough + download the updated templates here: https://smpl.is/ahrji #RealEstateFinance #ConstructionDraw #DevelopmentModeling #ExcelModeling #CommercialRealEstate #ACREBlog #CREDevelopment